Prgomet: Serious times require responsibility

Drago Prgomet of the coalition of independent slates which goes by the name MOST (Bridge) and which has won 19 parliamentary seats in Sunday's election, has said that nothing is as it was yesterday on the Croatian political scene and that the current situation is serious and requires serious social changes. If the SDP and the HDZ do not understand that, they do not understand the challenges of the present, said Prgomet.

In an interview with the regional TV network N1 on Monday, Prgomet said that MOST was not shunning any responsibility, including a public office. He said that his coalition had received a public invitation to talks from Zoran Milanovic and his SDP party, noting that MOST would accept invitations from all wishing to negotiate with it. "But private phone calls to me or any other member of MOST are out of the question," Prgomet said.

He said that it was important who MOST would support to form a new government and that MOST would decide who the next Prime Minister-designate would be.

The procedure for the formation of the government is clear, we are the winners of this election. There will be no new government without MOST and we will decide on the new prime minister and on the make-up of the new government, said Prgomet.

He added that MOST would not form a coalition with parties unwilling to implement reforms and that it would insist on it. We do not want to cause any instability in the country, he said.

Noting that it was irrelevant how many ministerial posts MOST would get and that some members of MOST had already said that they would support the left-wing Croatia Is Growing coalition, Prgomet said: "We are talking here about programmes and reforms. Anything else is completely irrelevant."

Asked to comment on the left coalition's invitation to MOST to start talks with it, Prgomet said that he did not know what it meant until the talks started. "We respect the decision made by Croatian voters, they have made it clear that they want changes. We will talk, that's the difference between us and our political opponents."

Prgomet said that MOST would insist on reforms even at the cost of disappearing from the political scene. "Those wishing to cooperate with us must be willing to lose the next election. We are ready for that, too."

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